


Well Matched

by Equinoctia



Category: Sherlock Holmes (Downey films)
Genre: Canon-Typical Violence, Competence Kink, F/M, Irene Adler being a badass, Kissing, Mild Smut, Missing Scene, Neck Kissing, One Shot, Period Typical Attitudes, Scent Kink, Sexual Tension, Sweat, Unresolved Romantic Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-17
Updated: 2020-06-17
Packaged: 2021-03-04 00:28:20
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,074
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24774646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Equinoctia/pseuds/Equinoctia
Summary: A missing scene/one-shot in which Holmes and Adler encounter one another around twenty minutes intoSherlock Holmes(2009, Ritchieverse).Holmes has just won his bare-knuckle boxing match, pulled the stopper out of a beer bottle with his teeth, and disappeared up the staircase...
Relationships: Irene Adler/Sherlock Holmes
Comments: 2
Kudos: 17





	Well Matched

**Author's Note:**

> This is the first fic I've ever finished writing, and the first I've posted. My usual online hangouts are among book blogging and literary fiction, and I've generally only been an occasional binge-reader of fanfic. 
> 
> RDJ's portrayal of Holmes has been my favourite since I saw the 2009 film in the cinema (and I'd been a fan of the Sherlock Holmes stories for many years before that), so I've had a while to think about some of this.
> 
> \----
> 
> In case it's a while since you watched the film, a summary of the preceding scene: 
> 
> At a point when Holmes was already in danger of losing his fight with the burly McMurdo, he caught sight of a handkerchief, embroidered "IA", draped over the ringside. Distracted as he tried to look for Irene in the crowd, he sustained further damage, but got up again, for a few seconds leaning on the handkerchief with an emotional expression and making eye-contact with Irene. He then apparently attempted to concede defeat to McMurdo. 
> 
> The bigger man was incensed by this, and spat at the back of Holmes' head. 
> 
> Holmes, after casually picking up the handkerchief to mop his neck, told himself "this mustn't register on an emotional level" and, in a characteristic guy Ritchie freeze-frame moment, rapidly devised a barrage of moves - beginning by throwing the handkerchief as a distraction - with which he soon knocked McMurdo right through the barriers of the wooden ring. 
> 
> Holmes picked up the handkerchief to wipe his face and pocketed it, walking nonchalantly out of the ring. From a bookie, he took a wad of banknotes; then he lifted a beer from the bar, removed the stopper with his teeth, and headed up a narrow wooden staircase.

Irene appeared from a corner near the top of the stairs. Holmes raised his eyebrows as he caught sight of her, allowing her to retain the impression she had surprised him once again.

"This is no place for a lady." As he lifted the bottle to his lips, there was an elegant flourish in the angle of his arm, and less of the navvy's swagger he'd had a minute earlier.

"And prize-fighting is no pastime for a gentleman." She ran a finger a couple of inches along his collarbone, his skin damp with sweat and blood, and she allowed her eyes to survey his glistening, muscled torso. Beneath her hat and her corset stirred ancient impulses from before there were ladies and gentlemen, when there was simply male and female. She imagined what they might do now if they were savages.

This was a dark corner, but it was still insufficiently discreet to speak in public with Adler, and he needed to dress. "This gentleman requires the rest of his clothes," he pointed out.

Across Irene's face flickered the ghost of a pout, before she composed herself once more.

Then they spoke a few words very quietly, solemnly, under the hubbub that rose from the crowd downstairs. He gave a wink as he turned away.

By the time Holmes had donned his shirt, cravat and jacket, Irene was walking down the street, about to round a corner.

After bantering briefly with the other men, Holmes bade them goodnight and left, going in the opposite direction along the same street. Irene had not yet stopped walking when they met, he having taken a quicker route to the same spot.

She smiled at him. "An admirable victory. Though I always understood that a handkerchief bestowed on a knight was to be returned if he won the tourney." 

"Perhaps… I am errant, ma'am. Forgive me." He slid his hand into his pocket, folded the handkerchief fondly, and offered it to her. "And I thank you for your congratulation." He bowed, and ostentatiously kissed her other hand.

They had found themselves by a decrepit stone building whose ground floor was fronted with a series of small archways and a walkway behind them. As they moved under one of the arches, Irene remarked, "This is an unusual location for a lady and a gentleman to find themselves so late at night." 

She turned towards Holmes and, with one step and a touch of the hand, backed him on to the side of the column. They were half-hidden, anonymous, yet with just enough light to see one another. She stroked his cheek with the backs of her fingers, looking into his soulful eyes in a glimmer of lamplight. Their depths often seemed to promise a world of tenderness, understanding and sensuality. Irene Adler knew far better than to believe most promises men uttered, let alone those they never spoke - and she knew this man's true nature. Nevertheless, in brief moments of abandon, she loved to lose herself in his eyes. Those moments meant more to her than it was wise to admit, even to herself. More than years with husbands who had bestowed the wealth of a duchess on her.

Which of them moved in first for the kiss, neither could tell.

From the softness of his lips on hers, from the touch of their tongues, the vital spark coursed through her body and her being. She yielded, allowing him to explore, conquer, possess her mouth, and, secretly, fleetingly, her very self. 

Irene broke the kiss. His stubble gave him an irresistible rakish beauty, but it would be hell for her skin to rub against it too long. Her face was part of her fortune - and besides, stubble burn was not among the more pleasurable pains of the sensual life.

She leaned down towards his neck and began a series of lingering kisses down one side. 

"Oh _Irene_ ," he breathed.

Her delight surged at eliciting this reaction, and from inhaling the smell of his skin. After kissing all the way down his neck, she buried her face in the wide collar of his shirt, while brushing two fingers up and down his nape with exquisite slowness. She drank in the scent of the champion's sweat and his brilliance, and began to slide her hand below, until she was smoothing it over trouser fabric and his shockingly hard arousal underneath, at which she couldn't help but glimpse down. Then, with, leisurely pace, she caressed back up his side, to his chest.

He lifted his hands away from her shoulders to take a delicate hold of her face, and bring it back towards his. They sank into one more kiss, a kiss which she started to feel she was mastering, as she teased and cajoled his tongue into retreat, anticipating the moment she could feel her own tongue inside his mouth. Irene became aware of an unwelcome presence close on her right, a presence which had approached them from the walkway. Holmes' body had tensed ever so slightly, signalling to her that he noticed it too. Her attention now divided, she maintained the gently passionate small movements of her tongue in union with his, neither advancing nor retreating, and at the same time she slid the flick-knife out of her sleeve and opened it in one fluid movement. A pickpocket groaned and began to amble away, leaving a few drops of blood on the paving. Holmes' mouth let Irene in to kiss him ever more deeply.

Rapturous though she felt in his embrace, she knew she would have to curtail the stubble-chafing, and she withdrew, pausing with a reverent small kiss on his lips. 

"It's been getting a little crowded round here", Irene observed, stepping out on to the pavement. 

"And there is the result of an experiment I must check back at Baker Street." 

Holmes took a few paces and gazed, contemplatively, in the direction that would bring oncoming traffic. Irene could see he was waiting to decompress, alone.

When the first hansom approached, he saw it was occupied, but the second, empty, clattered to a halt at his signal.

"Ladies first," he said as he returned to Irene and took her arm. He handed her into the cab, and she climbed in with her customary poise.

"Au revoir," Irene called from the seat. 

"Indeed". 

As the woman drove away, Sherlock Holmes walked on into the fog of the London night.

**Author's Note:**

> \- I assume that ladies' tokens to knights were sometimes kept when a tournament was won, but I haven't time to research dozens of accounts and papers. As Irene is an American in a British story, we can have her be a little hazy on such historical details, and of course the whole exchange is performative anyway. Holmes' 'Perhaps' is intended to reflect that she is not necessarily right, but that it suits him to play along with her.
> 
> -18/06 night: This has just had a few edits, following feedback from my friend W who beta-read it (thank you), and it may well get some more another day.


End file.
